Does balance shaft removal actually adds hp, or does it just help the car rev. I'm thinking of doing balance shft removal, if it adds noticable hp I would do it. Does anyone actually dynoed (or compared before/after 1/4 mile time) their car after removing their balance shaft? Please help. Thanks.

I did it to prevent the balance belt from breaking and causing havoc on my motor. Who cares if it creates horsepower, which I'm sure its not that noticable. I had the motor out so I said why the hell not.

Hmm, I guess I'll do this mod when/if I need to pull my engine. Thanks.

It does both. You are reducing parasitic drag on the crank via balance shaft belt. This gives you a little more HP. You are also allowing the engine to rev higher quicker, by reducing rotating mass.

Balance shafts can be a huge risk in a high revving motor! Bare in mind that they spin 2x the speed of the motor. So when you are at 8000rpms they are seeing 16000rpms, that is pretty fast for those bearing. So BS bearings wear out faster than any other bearings in our motors. If you are leaving balance shafts in a motor with over 120k miles, you should press-in new bearing and use new shafts!

Now, how many people actually do that? It is much easier to just get rid of them. Plus you do get a modest power increase. But that extra power (~5hp) should NOT be your first motivator…

Leon
RR

I got rid of them because they make timing belt jobs 200% easier.

No more lining up the balance shaft/oil pump marks! Just the cams and the crank.

Those things are long & heavy - much bigger than i thought!

I asked this in another post, but has anybody out there done this with the motor still in the car?

You can't do it the "right" way with the motor in the car.
If the motor is in the car you won't be able to remove the front shaft, you have to just leave it in. You just put the stubby shaft on the oil pump side, and bolt it back together.

You CAN do it while the motor is still in the car. You can either take a sawzall and slowly cut the cut into pieces until it completely comes out. Or, you can do it the way I did. You unbolt the front crossmember, and basically drop the motor about 4". Just keep dropping the motor until the shaft clears the fenderwell. Then it slides right out. It's not much fun trying to get the motor back up into place. The crossmember doesn't like to line up very easily. I had a jack on each side and slowly jacked up both sides at the same time.
It wasn't easy, but by no means impossible.

Mike

i'll definately be calling you when i get a weekend to pull these... there's always a half dozen tricks that i won't know about when pulling em out.

Leave the front shaft in if the engine is in the car - Not only will you catch hell getting the front shaft out - you MUST go in there & knock out the front inner bearing & re-orient it so as not to have a major hole directly off the Main Oil Galley via the bearing - It doesn't hurt a damn thing to leave the front one in. I popped a new seal on the front shaft - put the gear back on & let it ride - I did delete the little belt tensioner & plugged the hole with a short bolt & RTV - someone didn't do that & shot oil everywhere.

I removed my fronts and rear shafts w/ the engine still in. It was a pain in the @ss, if i had to do it again i'd just leave the front one in. I think the hardest part was getting the bearings out, because w/ the engine still in the car it's really awkward.

Originally posted by kpt4321
If the motor is in the car you won't be able to remove the front shaft, you have to just leave it in.

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Incorrect. You can remove the front shaft with the engine in the car; I did it. You just don't want to remove the front shaft with the engine in the car.

I ended up getting the front shaft out most of the way, and then just cut it with a hacksaw (yes, it took a while). DON'T DO THAT. You'll be unhappy later when you have to pound out the rear bearing with a two-piece shaft. Later on, with the transfer case dropped, the drivers' axle unbolted from the frame and dislodged from the transmission, and a lot of elbow grease, I got the engine lowered to the point where the shaft could be slid in and out properly, if I would have kept the shaft in one piece. (I ended up putting the rear portion of the balance shaft that I'd cut on a pipe, and pounded on the pipe.)

The result? An extremely light increase in idle vibration, and no noticable (on the butt-dyno) performance increase. However, timing belt changes will be a lot easier now that I don't have to line up the shaft or replace the balance shaft belt. And there's a lot of peace-of-mind that comes along with having less stuff in there to fail.

^^^:laugh: that's exactly what i had to do w/ my front shaft

There has to be some immediate benefits to the oiling system - for those of you who have yet to tear into it you'll see that the rear balance shaft is oil fed DIRECTLY off the Oil Pump. Certainly those of you who paid the Ultimate price & fought that front one out & then somehow got in there to block that large bearing have even a little better oil flow than those of us who still lug our front balance shafts around - As I said that front one is fed straight off the Main Oil Galley - Those damn balance shafts got first crack at all the oil before "little things" like main bearings & rods.

I did it with the engine still in the car, the hardest part is getting the new or used bearing back in to seal the hole. Every thing came out easy though. Just used the rear shaft to knock the fornt bearing out and to drive the new one in.

My car's engine don't need to be pulled for a while, the timing belt has just been replaced. So I guess I won't do this mod (for now). Thanks for the replies.

So for the front shaft, you can basically just cut the belt off. Does the saft need to be aligned in any certain way?

-Dustin

Originally posted by krustindumm
So for the front shaft, you can basically just cut the belt off. Does the saft need to be aligned in any certain way?-Dustin

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yes - you can just cut the front belt - no alignment, etc.